Basketball On The Internet.

WHEN the NBL tipped off, there was one coaching doyen known as Brian and it wasn't our man Goorjian. It was Brian Kerle, a four-time NBL championship ooach, multiple champion as a player at St Kilda in the game's halcyon era and a 1972 Olympian. Yep, Brad Rosen and I this week feature an all-time great of the game, BRIAN KERLE.

On alternate weeks now we're featuring a "Blast from the Past" style guest at our Brad&Boti podcast and who better than one of the NBL's original great coaches, promoters and entrepreneurs?

Recognised as the face of Brisbane basketball and a man who still stays heavily involved in the sport through his BK Basketball, Brian Kerle was a star on court with St Kilda from 1967, winning VBA and Australian Club Championship titles.

He regularly represented Victoria at national championships and was a member of the Australian team which contested the 1972 Munich Olympic Games, sandwiched between FIBA World Championship appearances for the Boomers in 1970 and 1974.

Eventually succeeding era legends such as Ken Cole and David Lindstrom as St Kilda coach, he guided them to the inaugural NBL championship in 1979 using an all-Australian lineup.

That squad remains the only team in NBL history to claim the crown without an import, yet when St Kilda went back-to-back in 1980, it was with one of the greatest imports of all time in Rocky Smith.

On course for a threepeat which was sabotaged by basketball administrators, Kerle continued on as St Kilda coach until 1983 before returning home to Brisbane where he steered the Bullets to two championships, coaching the NBL's all-time greatest import player, Leroy Loggins.

So where does he rank Leroy? Rocky? Ken Richardson? What does he think about past Aussie greats such as Larry Sengstock? And what does he have in common with another great of the game and recent two-time podcast guest, Chris Anstey?

Tune in by clicking this link to hear who Brian believes are the three greatest imports to play in this country and where he ranks Perth superstar Bryce Cotton. (Not that he's into comparing players of different eras.)

We cover many of his former players and on the NBL front, Brad still sneaks in his Rosen Rattler alongside my Nagy Nasty and you can hear it all on your way home from work at Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or at this link. Enjoy.